Food in Britain

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Food in Britain

What do you think of as typical British food? Roast beef? Fish and chips? Tea and cakes? Or maybe there's more to British food than that? Check out this video to find out about what people in the UK are eating these days.

Instructions

Do the preparation task first. Then, watch the video and do the exercises. Remember you can read the transcript at any time.

Preparation

Check your food vocabulary by doing this exercise before you watch the video.

This video is part of our Word on the Street series. Word on the Street is an exciting new English Language teaching programme co-produced by the BBC and the British Council.

Check your vocabulary: gap fill - countries and nationalities

In this exercise you see the nationalities. Type the countries in the gap.

Check your vocabulary: matching - food

Check your understanding of the food items that appeared in the video by doing this exercise.

Worksheets and downloads

Transcript

Carmen: The Chinese introduced oriental food to Britain. But before the Chinese, immigrants from all around the world came to live in London.

British people enjoy a huge range of food and flavours from other countries.

This is Borough Market, London’s oldest food market. Today, you can find food here from all over the world.

This is Italian cheese. Each group of settlers brought their own food and styles of cooking and people here embraced the exciting new flavours… maybe because British food wasn’t very good.

Restaurants from all around the world can be found on most British high streets. Indian, Chinese, Greek, Italian, Spanish, Persian... the list goes on.

But just what are the UK’s favourite dishes?

On the Street: My favourite meal is Thai green curry.

On the Street: One of my favourite meals is... cottage pie with peas.

On the Street: My favourite food is... Chinese ... Chinese.

On the Street: What’s my favourite meal? Still full English breakfast.

......

Chef: This is a full English breakfast. Tomato, black pudding, sausage, bacon, egg, mushroom.

......

Carmen: A big fried breakfast might not be to everyone’s taste. But in Britain, there is something for everyone.

Celia Brooks Brown is a food writer and knows all about food and the future of food in the UK, today.

Mmm! It looks good. What have we got here, Celia?

Celia: Well, this is a British tomato salad with a Yorkshire-made sheep’s cheese. And here we have a Barnsley lamb chop with new potatoes and a mint hollandaise sauce.

Carmen: So is this a sign of developments in British cooking?

Celia: Yes, people want to know where their food comes from. Chefs in restaurants like these are reinventing classic British dishes. They’re using ingredients that are locally sourced and locally grown.

Carmen: So what about world cuisine?

Celia: Well, anything goes. Chefs love to experiment with ingredients from different cultures. And we live in a globalised society, it’s very exciting.

Carmen: OK, Celia, if you were cooking these dishes at home, what ingredients from different cultures would you use?

Celia: Well, I might use something like this. This is a Moroccan spice mix called Ras el Hanout. Have a sniff.

Carmen: Hmm. That’s really strong.

Celia: Lovely, isn’t it? Now, this might make a lovely spice rub for that lamb chop.

Carmen: I can’t wait to taste this.

......

Carmen: The food in Britain reflects the many different cultures here. But some of the old favourites are here to stay. I’m off for my favourite, fish and chips. Want a chip?

Discussion

Comments

Britain - mix of the culture from different countries and food is not an exception! So in Britain you can taste food of countries which are not well-known (but also very delicious).
If you want to taste meals from other countries, you must to visit Britain

As I understood, modern British cuisin contains food from different coutries.Of course, the British still have their original dishes, but they (the dishes) should have changed a lot under the influence of cooking traditions of the UK settlers. As for me, I'm interested in tastying pure British food. Famous British pudding, for example. (Yes, I'm quite a sweet tooth ^^)

I never tasted Britain food.On the video, it seem fantastic, yummy and good but my older sister often says it terrible, it has all fish and chips, she don't want to taste it anymore but she has to because..... she is in british! :D

Hi Brenda15 and HipsterPizza! You might already know this, but the word 'rich' when you are talking about food has quite a specific meaning in English. It doesn't exactly mean tasty or delicious, and it's not about how much it costs either. Rich food is food that is heavy, filling and calorific, and it is usually quite unhealthy and contains lots of fat or sugar. Here are some examples of rich food:

Hi Lavender. I know what you mean. These days I don't often have rich food but the exception is at Christmas, when we have things like Christmas pudding and mince pies which are very rich indeed. :)
Jonathan (LearnEnglish Teens Team)